Greenies Pill Pockets

Oscar nominated project’Lion’ began from the scratch. Directore Garth Davis before starting with his the much awaited project made sure that there are no loopholes in his research so he made his trip to India. As the homeland of the main character in the movie is from India, he thought there is no better way […]

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I should’ve been fasting these past 10 days out in the hinterlands of Tennessee. All alone in my trusty tent starving myself of sustenance in order to achieve some greater clarity, understanding and context that occasionally is lost to me. Heck I was packed up and ready to head out and then something stopped me. Can’t say what for sure – but the cascade of events set in motion since have been nothing short of metamorphic.

Recently, I met a man who showed me another way and for the past two weeks I’ve been doing some serious transcendental shit; acupuncture, chanting, Reiki and sensory deprivation (not like Altered States – I’m already a beast of a man but more internal, intrinsic). If I didn’t know better I’d think I’d been smoking some serious Humboldt county style Boo-Ya. Yes, yes I got a PhD in weed on the west coast.

Sure, I’ve acknowledged the possibility and potential of and even dabbled in these Eastern type practices but never personally, truly, and profoundly have I explored them. And now I’m down in it.

So where is it going to take me? What’s the endpoint of it all? To this, I am as yet uncertain. But here’s what I have learned thus far on this new path.

The Fallacy of ‘What Should Happen Should Happen’

I was never any good at Logic – not the concept or application of it – but in the scholastic sense and as a subset of philosophy. So in attempting to make sense of the sequence of events that led me here to this time and place – I made up this fallacy which is basically the basis of flawed logic.

People often ask me why did you walk those thousands of miles. Oh sure, I’ve got a pocket full of reasons. The fun, flippant one – everything is bigger in Texas and when we lose a dog to cancer down there we don’t walk around a park, we walk cross country. Then I’ve got the media sound bite version – sharing Malcolm and Murphy’s story from town to town to raise awareness of the epidemic of canine cancer. I’ve got many more but you get the point.

Perhaps they are all truths or variations of the same one but for me it’s because I believed walking from Austin to Boston would help heal my loss of Malcolm, to soothe my savage heart. And then within weeks of the final mile, Murphy was diagnosed and, well, most of you know the rest of that story.

And so I walked another 1,700 miles doubling down on the belief that THAT would heal me.

You see the fallacy in this logic? That because I believed it should, it should’ve. But it didn’t.

Luke 4:23

You know, it’s commonly thought that the origin of my name is ‘light giving’ and the best known example of it is the apostle Paul’s traveling companion and doctor. This proverb – I had to look that up since, um, well I usually skipped Bible study in search of less pious pursuits shall we say – in Latin reads cura te ipsum - ‘Physician heal thyself’ something that’s been a bit of an impossibility for me it seems.

I suppose my post-facto rationalization has always been – I never spare myself any emotion for Malcolm and Murphy no matter how painful. I can endure it. Just like so many nights on the road and asea, I can weather this storm. But I have suffered so.

Self-imposed or not.

Disconnection

Back to this newfound friend of mine, whom I barely even know. He showed me that pain can be a way to separate yourself from others. To disconnect from them. Furthermore, he said that people like me unknowingly use tragedy to spare themselves from the need and necessity of love and letting others in.

I’m not sure if I believe all of his bullshit yet – but hey, I’m listening. You see, it’s one thing to turn tragedy into action – oh, I’ve done that and then some. It’s quite another thing to allow that experience to truly transform you. And it’s here I find myself at this intersection.

Life Off Road

Not to put too fine a point on it but I’ve become a bit of an expert on backpacking the byways, highways, back roads and farm roads of this incredible land of ours. But take me off and away from it and I tend to fall apart. Perhaps it’s because I’m always in pursuit of an idea, a belief, a cause – our cause – that remains elusive to me. Or maybe it’s as simple as finding sedentary existence unsettling and like Carthamus I’m damned to a life of wandering and wondering.

And while I have been pretty good at chronicling and sharing my journeys on the road with you, I’ve been decidedly deficit in talking about it off, especially post west coast. From now on, that will change. I won’t let fear, doubt, uncertainty, darkness or utter despair disconnect me from you again.

In part because some of you have said to me you find the latter much more inspiring and relatable if not essential than the former. And in part because my new friend tells me to.

That and I need a simpler formula for existence. I live. I learn. I write. Something like that… just less cheesy and Julia Roberts sounding.

Postscripts

Two blogs in draft right now (1) On Turning 36 – My travels and adventurin’ have taken their toll on Yer Big Dog so I lick my wounds and tell tales about it; (2) The Theory of Cancer – lately my thinking has gotten so abstract and theoretical about the evolution of cancer. Where is it going and how can that affect our thinking about the future of therapeutics? On societal and civil re-engineering? Reflections on my conversations with thought leaders and a whole host of other ideas – this will definitely be a multi-part project.

There are more… lots more but I’m attempting to do a better job of prioritizing my crazy.

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YBD’s Notes 1: The name of this blog has a special meaning to me. Back when I was a businessman in Texas I would often take Malcolm up to my office in the evenings and that inspired a series of writings I entitled Midnight with Malcolm. Dunno what the change denotes quite yet…

YBD’s Notes 2: I stuff hyperlinks in my blogs if’n anyone wants to learn more about things that fascinate me but be forewarned – logic will make yer eyes water.

YBD’s Notes 3: Upon further reflection ‘What Should Happen Should Happen’ SHOULD be a fallacy. Oh boy.

YBD’s Notes 4: Coincidentally, whilst recently consolidating all of my scant worldly possessions from around the country, I found this photo of me taken at the blessing of my childhood home. I’ve seen too much of this world in this life to believe in coincidences. Thanks to my sister-in-law Linda for preserving it. Nice bowl cut, Mom

YBD’s Notes 5: I should choose a name for my new friend – he’s not imaginary. I Promise. At least in my mind. In this room. That’s white. And padded.

YBD’s Notes 6: Perhaps it’s still too early for me to write – no, I’m always doing that – to publish about these transcendental, metaphysical experiences and experiments. But hey, at least I’m rounding again.

In today’s environment, more and more animals suffer from allergies, from food allergies to seasonal as well as environmental. Just like in humans, some dogs will have savior symptoms, other barely show any and sometimes we don’t connect the symptoms to allergies. Here are a few different type of allergies and the symptoms you should look out for.

FOOD ALLERGIES

Food allergy is the most common allergy among dogs; It is also quite uncomfortable and painful for the dog and very difficult to cure. The components of the canine diet, which often cause allergy are, for example, specific meats and offal, pork usually is one of them, some fats, but also various kinds of ready-made dishes containing eggs or heavily processed ingredients. Some dogs also may be allergic to grain and dairy products.

The symptoms of food allergy are quite different with each animal, it is mostly causing persistent itching and scratching by the dog large areas of hair and skin, leading up to the formation of wounds. Besides, there is hair loss around the eyes, feet, and sometimes ear infections. More and more common symptoms are stomach problems, mainly diarrhea occurring but irregularly. These symptoms may be mistaken for a number of different diseases, which is why allergy is not always the first suspect. To make sure that the symptoms stem from a food allergy, enter the dog elimination diet – serve only foods based on meat, fish, rabbit, buffalo or lamb. It is good to exclude grains like rice, and replace them with properly prepared potatoes.

SEASONAL ALLERGIES

Every year we see increasingly affect of seasonal allergies on more and more pets, just like people they are allergic to various types of pollen, dust mites or molds and fungi. Just as in humans, allergy inhaled can cause a rash, itching, but also respiratory problems and asthma attacks. In the case of this type of allergy, I would recommend performing allergy tests, which indicate specific factors your dog is allergenic to. Usually, it is impossible to eliminate the factor from your dog’s environment, but there are several ways to heal allergies – desensitization to certain allergens, the administration of appropriate drugs and non-steroidal support dietary unsaturated. Note, however, that this type of allergy practically can not be cured and you have to be aware of her relapses and the fact that it can regularly appear in your dog’s life.

CONTACT ALLERGY

Contact allergy also known as contact dermatitis is a skin disease that can occur when a dog or cat makes physical contact with a chemical or other irritating substance and has a negative reaction. in animals most often occurs in contact with various antiparasitic formulations, whether in the form of a collar or liquid drops. For this reason, veterinarians recommend regular changes of product so the body does not consider them an allergen. When we are dealing with a contact allergy in a dog, the main symptom is persistent itching and scratching, sometimes rash. The best way to heal this condition is to remove the allergen and wash areas with water, which will faster relief the symptoms. Sometimes if your dog has a strong reaction it is necessary to provide the appropriate medication.

DOG AND FLEA ALLERGY DERMATITIS

This type of allergy is a very common disease for both cats and dogs. You can often encounter an allergic reaction to the feces of fleas left on dogs, which lived in bad conditions or were exposed to strong and frequent contact with fleas. The symptoms are usually itching, persistent scratching and in further stages severe rash. In the case of this type of allergic reaction, it is necessary for you to visit a vet, who will prescribe the appropriate medication, mainly steroidal anti-inflammatory as well as bathe the dog in the medicated flea shampoo and also protect them from flea infestation, by using one of the available flea preventative products. It is also important to remove fleas and their larvae from the environment – dog bedding, carpets in the house and all the places that the dog had contact.

Either your dogs show symptoms of allergies or not it is a good idea to have them tested, especially that now allergy testing is really simple and relatively inexpensive. You can order the online kit, provide a sample of your dog’s hair as well as a saliva sample, you will receive a detail report containing food and environmental allergies. Just because your dog does not show any symptoms, that does not mean he is not sensitive to some foods or environmental products, it’s always good to know what to avoid to keep your pets healthy and happy.

Dog breed origins are often shrouded in a “creation myth.” If you ever read an all-breed dog book, the official breed origins come across as awfully fanciful. Virtually every breed is regarded as ancient or derived from some private stock belonging to some notable: Afghan hounds were the dogs Noah took on the Ark. Beagles appear on the Bayeux Tapestry. Pharaoh hounds were the hunting dogs of the Ancient Egyptian dynasties.

These stories posit the breed as being part of something deep in the past and maintaining the breeds is magnified as a way of paying homage to the past.

Some breeds are, however, pretty old, or at least genetically distinct from the rest of dogdom to be seen as something unique. Chow chows are a good example. They retain a lot of unique, primitive characters, and as East Asian primitive dogs, they may be among the oldest of strains still in existence.

Konrad Lorenz deeply admired the breed’s wolf-like attributes, believing they represented the best of the so-called “Lupus dogs.” Lorenz believed that most dogs were actually the descendants of golden jackals, and the dogs were friendly to most people and easily broken to fit the will of man. These were the “Aureus dogs.” But the dogs that were more aloof and more independent of the wishes of their masters were seen as the direct descendants of wolves. Lorenz preferred this type of dog, and he kept many chows and chow crosses in crosses as his own personal dogs and “study subjects.”

Lorenz later rejected the dichotomy between the jackal and wolf dogs, but the idea is still worth exploring. What Lorenz actually discovered was a profound division that exists in domestic dogs: the primitive versus the derived.

In terms of evolution, an organism is considered primitive if it retains characters and behavior that are very like the ancestral form. For example, lemurs are considered more primitive than other primates because they have the long muzzles and wet noses of the ancestral primates.

Primitive dogs are those that retain many features in common with the wolf. These features include erect ears, pointed muzzles, howling rather than barking, bitches having only one heat cycle per year, pair-bonding behavior, and general tendency not to be obedient. Many primitive dogs bond with only a single person, and in the most extreme cases, allow only that person to touch them.

Lots of “Nordic” breeds fall into this category, but this list also includes many of the drop-eared sighthounds from Central Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, and the Indian Subcontinent. It also includes many of the village dogs from undeveloped countries, as well as the semi-domesticated pariah dogs and dingoes.

The chow chow sort of fit between both Nordic breed type and the village dog type. It has many of the features of the Nordic breeds– curled tail and prick ears– but it also has had a long history as a village dog in China, where it had periods in which it freely bred.

One would think that chow chow fanciers would be into celebrating their dogs as primitives, like owning something between wild and domestic.

But dog people being dog people are more than willing to add embellishments.

However, dog breeders will often go to great lengths to justify breeding decisions, including putting out absolute science fiction as scientific fact.

A few years ago, I heard an acquaintance mention that a well-educated chow owner she knew firmly believed that chow chow were derived from bears.

I laughed at it. I did not think there was a serious discussion that chow chows were derived from bears.

And then I received notice of this website, which purports to have the full history of the chow chow. The history begins as follows:

It´s assumed that during the Miocene period (between 28 to 12 million years back), the evolution of the Hemicyon, an intermediary between the Cynoelesmus [sic], “father” of all the canine ones, and the Daphoneus [sic] – from which the bears descend as we know them today, – originated the Simocyon, an animal that varied between a fox and a small bear that inhabited in the sub-Arctic regions Siberia and the Northwest of Mongolia and of which it is known had 44 teeth.

I don’t know where this actually comes from, but it is entirely in ignorance of what we now know about the evolution of bears and dogs. Dogs and bears are indeed closely related, but the division between the two is much deeper than the dates proposed here. Their most recent common ancestor was the ancestral stem-caniform miacid, which lived about 40 million years ago. Most of the “ancestors” mention here are actually evolutionary dead ends that have little to do with modern bears or dogs.

First of all Hemicyon was not an intermediary between dogs and bears. The Hemicyon family was actually a branch of the bear lineage. Unlike the true bears, it was digitigrade and was probably a cursorial predator like wolves are today. The Hemicyon family lived between 11 and 17 million years ago, and it has left no living descendants. That is, it is in no way an intermediary form between dogs and bears.

The author mentions “Cynoelesmus,” probably meaning Cynodesmus. My guess is this discrepancy comes from a poor cut-and-paste job, but although Cynodesmus was a primitive dog. It is not the ancestor of all living dogs. The ancestor of all living dogs was Leptocyon. Leptocyon was once considered part of Cynodesmus, but it is no longer.

The other two ancient creatures mentioned in the opening have nothing to do with bears or dogs.

“Daphoneus,” which refers to Daphoenus, a type of Amphicyonid. Amphicyonids were are really spectacular sister family to the canids, which had traits in common with both bears and dogs but really behaved more like big cats. This family has nothing to do with evolution of dogs, except that this is a sister lineage that went extinct.

Simocyon was actually something even a little bit cooler. It was not a dog. It was not a bear. It wasn’t even in the lineage of either family. Instead, it was a genus of leopard-sized animals much more closely related to the red panda. In case you were wondering, red pandas are not closely related to giant pandas. Giant pandas are actually a primitive form of bear. Red pandas are their own thing. Modern red pandas are the only species in their family known as Ailuridae. Millions of years ago, there were several species of red panda, and Simocyon was actually a large predatory red panda. Like the modern red panda, Simocyon had a thumb formed out of its sesamoid bone. Giant pandas have this thumb, and it was thought to connect both modern species of panda. Now, we know that the giant panda, which is a true bear, actually evolved its sesamoid thumb in parallel to the red panda. The red panda lineage evolved this trait so they could more easily climb in trees, while the giant panda evolved it to hold bamboo.

So that entire introduction to chow chow history is simply wrong. It may have been correct carnivoran paleontology at one point, but it also seems that the originators of this theory just went around looking for creatures that sounded like they might be fossil dogs that could be found in Asia. “Cyon” does mean dog, but it doesn’t always refer to dogs in scientific names. Remember that there is a primitive whale the unfortunate name of “Basilosaurus,” which is in no way related to any lizard or dinosaur, and the raccoon family is called “Procyonids,” even though they aren’t that closely related to dogs.

Again, I don’t know why this theory is so popular, except that it can be used as a defense for breeding more and more bear-like features into chow chows than they had when they first came into the West. It’s also a way of making chows so much more super-special than the were before.

But it really makes chow fanciers look silly to anyone who has ever looked closely at carnivoran evolution.

It’s a fun story, but it’s not based in reality.

And when you get the paleontology this wrong, then virtually nothing of value can be trusted until the error is corrected.